A Few Notes More
by clagjanet
Summary: Sequel to "Two Notes". Takes place a few days later.


This was one of my earliest stories and as I've moved along creating a somewhat parallel universe in my writing, it became apparent that this story needed a slight tweak to make it fit my canon ( or should that be "Jan-on"?). Story is really unchanged, just adjusted slightly to fit in with the way "Sometimes the Best Stories" and "Bet on it" took me later.

And as usual the disclaimer: none of these characters belong to me; they belong to Shoot the Moon Enterprises and Warner Bros to whom I am eternally grateful for the opportunity to take them out for a spin and bit of light humour.

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Billy had expected to be the last one to arrive for the Monday morning meeting since Dr Smyth had kept him longer than usual but as he came down the corridor past the elevator, he was surprised to see Amanda King emerge, still in outdoor clothes and carrying a takeout tray of coffees.

"Good morning sir!" Amanda's smile lifted his spirit as it always did and her dark brown eyes sparkled from under the brim of her woolen winter hat. "I was worried I was late because I had to stop at the pharmacy up the block for some headache tablets and since that coffee shop with the good coffee is right next door, I took a chance and went to get us all something on my way back, but the line was a little longer than I'd expected but anyway, here we are."

The Amanda ramble had continued all the way across the bullpen and into his office where Francine and Lee were already sitting chatting. Lee had jumped up as they came in to take the tray from her hands and after placing it on the desk, went to his usual spot to lean against the window.

"Sir, yours is the one with the stir-stick and Francine, I brought you hot chocolate" which earned her a pleased smile from the beautiful blonde. "No Lee, not that one – it has sugar in it."

Billy had stopped to help Amanda off with her coat but as she turned to thank him and pulled off her hat, his eyes widened. It was obvious that Amanda had received some kind of head injury since he had seen her on Friday. A giant purple bruise covered most of her forehead and he could see the healing scar where she had obviously had received a serious blow.

Before he could say anything, Amanda leaned forward to pat his arm reassuringly. "It's fine. Nothing extra strength Tylenol won't cure". She turned and dropped into the chair to Francine's left.

"Amanda, what on earth happened to you? You two weren't working this weekend were you?" He swiveled to look at the senior agent in time to see Lee's lips twitch before his expression became innocent and then watched as Lee turned to Amanda and winced slightly at the bruise. Billy smiled inwardly at Lee's muted reaction as he thought to himself, "So this isn't the first time you've seen her since this happened because otherwise you'd be yelling by now. Who do you two think you're kidding?"

Francine looked up as Amanda sat down and after an initial gasp, she leaned forward and drawled "My, my, my Amanda! Rough date this weekend? Did you get that from anyone we know? Don't spare us any of the delightful details."

"No sir, not work. And no Francine", Amanda shot her an annoyed glance, "not play either. This was entirely self-inflicted."

"Of course it was. Housework is so dangerous! That's why I never do any" smirked Francine. "Good thing you didn't get hit any lower or you'd have a black eye to go with that goose egg."

Billy had been about to put a stop to Francine's jabs when to his delight he saw what he liked to call That Look come over Amanda's face. Instead he settled back into his chair and prepared to enjoy the show and watched as Lee did the same.

Amanda leaned forward and smiled gently at Francine. "I know, right? I'm so lucky. Can you imagine how much fieldwork I'd have to miss if I'd broken it? Although I suppose if it had happened at work, I might have had medical coverage for a _really good nose job_."

Billy could barely keep his laughter in as this shot landed and Francine's brows snapped together and she turned to glare at Lee. Billy's efforts not to laugh was not helped by the sight of Lee suddenly struggling to get a breath, having made the rookie error of taking a sip of coffee just as Amanda had begun speaking. It was obvious from Lee's reaction and Amanda's much-too-innocent expression that Lee had told her that particular field story. He decided maybe it was Francine who needed rescuing, with a bit of distraction.

"So what did happen, Amanda?"

"Oh it was silly really. I was trying to fix our sink and someone came into the room and startled me. I sat up without thinking and banged my head on the pipe."

"Oh so this happened at home? Well that's good – at least that meant your mother was able to look after you then?"

"My mother?" Something about Amanda's confused reply had set Lee off shaking with silent laughter for no reason that Billy could understand, although he suspected it had not been her mother who had caused this accident.

"Well, I assumed since you were at home that your mother was there."

Lee managed to stop laughing long enough to lean forward and smile at his partner. "Yeah Amanda, did your _mother"_ he paused for a moment "make you feel better about banging your head?"

Billy watched as a blush rose on Amanda's face but her eyes were sparkling with merriment as she lifted her hand and jabbed a finger in his direction.

"Lee! Leave my mother…" but she never finished the sentence because something about her words and the way she was holding up one finger had set Lee off laughing again, to the complete bafflement of the others in the room.

Amanda looked at her finger and bit her lip to keep from laughing herself. She slowly lowered her hand to her lap and waited for Lee to get control of himself only for him to ask again, "So did she?"

Billy was just starting to wonder how he was going to get this meeting back on a serious footing when Amanda leaned forward to match Lee's posture and said gently, "Not exactly". To Billy's astonishment, at those two words, an arrested expression went across Lee's face, and then he leaned back against the window, raising his coffee cup towards his partner in some sort of silent acknowledgement that she had scored a point. Amanda had waited to see his reaction, and then smiling to herself, she had also leaned back into her chair and turned to Billy.

"I'm so sorry sir. You've probably been waiting to get the meeting started and here we've all just been rambling about my silly accident."

Unsure of how exactly his Arlington housewife had silenced the mighty Scarecrow, Billy nonetheless grabbed the opportunity she offered.

"Alright people! Let's get started. Just two notes…" Billy looked down at his files and thus missed his two favourite agents simultaneously choking on their coffee.

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Finishing up the day's files later that day, Lee leaned back and stretched in his chair. It was nearly quitting time and he had promised Jamie that he'd come by their house that night to help him with his science project.

Science project: two words he would never have expected to hear out of his mouth just a few years ago. He started to chuckle recalling that morning's meeting. In all his years working with Amanda, few things had made him laugh as hard as her two-notes, or even that surprising one-note of last Friday night.

He picked up his coffee cup and taking a sip, thought again about Amanda's final shot at him during the meeting that morning.

" _Not exactly"_

He could still recall the abrupt stop and then rapid pounding his heart had gone through that day in the hallway when she had dropped that particular two-note in response to his standard rambling nonsense about how their night on the run had meant nothing. They had shared an on-going flirtation for years at that point, but something had changed between them that night and in two words, Amanda had let him know she was not going to let him continue to ignore it.

He looked across at Amanda's empty desk, and reached into his pocket to pull out his wedding band, rolling it back and forth between his fingers, before slipping it onto his ring finger. He thought back to the conversation he had had with Billy after the meeting had finished. He knew Billy knew enough about him and Amanda to not be surprised that Lee had been around for the sink incident, although Lee had let him think it had happened at Amanda's house rather than his apartment. There was something about Billy knowing that Amanda felt comfortable enough to be alone at his place doing home repairs that made it seem like it was part of the mystery marriage. The mystery part of which he was beginning to realize was a really terrible idea.

"Hell" he muttered to himself. Billy was his best friend, after Amanda, and his only married-man friend and he could share so little of it with him. He had sketched out the bare bones of the story of Amanda's unexpected outburst when she'd hurt himself and they had both belly laughed for about a minute straight. When he had finally stopped laughing, he had wiped the tears from his eyes and said "I haven't seen you this happy in years, Lee. You should marry that woman, you know". Lee had felt so guilty that he hadn't even been able to dredge up his usual flippant response. He had married that woman and dammit, he wanted to be able to tell people.

" _I do"_

The best two-note she had ever said to him and he could share it with no one. Who was he kidding? He loved Amanda with his whole heart and it was time to tell the people they loved the truth.

He looked up as Amanda breezed into the office. Something about the expression on his face made her stop and smile softly at him, before slipping around the desk to drop a light kiss on his lips. "Hey Big Fella, watcha thinking about?"

Lee's arms encircled her waist and pulled her in for a deeper kiss.

"Just you"

"Mmmm, nice two-note, Scarecrow"

They sat for a moment quietly, foreheads touching until Lee pulled back and looked her in the face.

"Amanda, I've been thinking". He paused.

"Me too"

He searched her face and found what he was looking for in her eyes.

"We need to stop hiding."

"yes we do. How about we try and figure it out before Christmas? That gives us a month"

"Deal. I love you Mrs. Stetson."

"I love you too Mr. Stetson."

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End file.
